IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ebl/ecbull/eb-06b00002.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Is the Invisible Hand un− Smithian? A Comment on Rothschild

Author

Listed:
  • N. Emrah Aydinonat

    (Ankara University)

Abstract

Rothschild (2001) argues that the invisible hand refers to blind individuals and presume privileged knowledge on the part of the social scientist. For this reason, she takes it that the invisible hand is, in fact, an un− Smithian concept and that Smith was making an ironical joke. In this brief comment, I argue that the invisible hand does not imply blind and futile individuals or privileged knowledge and it cannot be argued that it is an un− Smithian concept on these grounds. Briefly, it is argued here that although it may be true that Smith used the invisible hand somewhat ironically, this does not imply that it is un− Smithian.

Suggested Citation

  • N. Emrah Aydinonat, 2006. "Is the Invisible Hand un− Smithian? A Comment on Rothschild," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 2(2), pages 1-9.
    • Handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-06b00002
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.accessecon.com/pubs/EB/2006/Volume2/EB-06B00002A.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. William D. Grampp, 2000. "What Did Smith Mean by the Invisible Hand?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(3), pages 441-465, June.
    2. Pascal Bridel & Christophe Salvat, 2004. "Reason and sentiments: review of Emma Rothschild's Economic Sentiments: Adam Smith, Condorcet and the Enlightenment," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(1), pages 131-145.
    3. Lindgren, J Ralph, 1969. "Adam Smith's Theory of Inquiry," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 77(6), pages 897-915, Nov./Dec..
    4. Rothschild, Emma, 1994. "Adam Smith and the Invisible Hand," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 84(2), pages 319-322, May.
    5. Sugden, Robert, 2002. "Beyond sympathy and empathy: Adam Smith's concept of fellow-feeling," Economics and Philosophy, Cambridge University Press, vol. 18(1), pages 63-87, April.
    6. Walter Eltis, 2004. "Emma Rothschild on economic sentiments: and the true Adam Smith," The European Journal of the History of Economic Thought, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 11(1), pages 147-159.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. N. Emrah Aydinonat, 2006. "Institutions: Theory, History and Context-Specific Analysis," History of Economic Ideas, Fabrizio Serra Editore, Pisa - Roma, vol. 14(3), pages 145-158.
    2. Anthony Brewer, 2009. "On the Other (Invisible) Hand..," History of Political Economy, Duke University Press, vol. 41(3), pages 519-543, Fall.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. repec:ebl:ecbull:v:2:y:2006:i:2:p:1-9 is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Pedro Garcia Duarte & Yann Giraud, 2014. "Chasing the B: A Bibliographic Account of Economics’ Relation to its Past, 1991-2011," Working Papers, Department of Economics 2014_06, University of São Paulo (FEA-USP).
    3. Horn, Karen, 2019. "The difficult relationship between historical ordoliberalism and Adam Smith," Freiburg Discussion Papers on Constitutional Economics 19/3, Walter Eucken Institut e.V..
    4. Paul Oslington, 2012. "God and the Market: Adam Smith’s Invisible Hand," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 108(4), pages 429-438, July.
    5. repec:ejw:journl:v:1:y:2004:i:3:p:381-412 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. repec:jpe:journl:820 is not listed on IDEAS
    7. Shaun P. Hargreaves Heap, 2013. "Rationality," Chapters, in: Luigino Bruni & Stefano Zamagni (ed.), Handbook on the Economics of Reciprocity and Social Enterprise, chapter 28, pages 277-284, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    8. Avner Offer, 2012. "Self-interest, Sympathy and the Invisible Hand : From Adam Smith to Market Liberalism," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 1(2), pages 1-1, December.
    9. repec:osf:osfxxx:ygpmq_v1 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Bruce E. Kaufman, 2016. "Adam Smith’s Economics and the Modern Minimum Wage Debate:The Large Distance Separating Kirkcaldy from Chicago," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 37(1), pages 29-52, March.
    11. Carlos Rodríguez Braun, 2021. "Adam Smith’s liberalism," The Review of Austrian Economics, Springer;Society for the Development of Austrian Economics, vol. 34(4), pages 465-478, December.
    12. Laurie Bréban, 2018. "An Investigation into the Smithian System of Sympathy: from Cognition to Emotion," Post-Print hal-03904227, HAL.
    13. Luca Zarri, 2007. "Happiness, Morality and Game Theory," Chapters, in: Luigino Bruni & Pier Luigi Porta (ed.), Handbook on the Economics of Happiness, chapter 16, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    14. repec:jpe:journl:2029 is not listed on IDEAS
    15. Enrico Colombatto, 2014. "Hayek and economic policy (the Austrian road to the third way)," Chapters, in: Roger W. Garrison & Norman Barry (ed.), Elgar Companion to Hayekian Economics, chapter 15, pages 343-363, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    16. Laurie Bréban & Muriel Gilardone, 2019. "A missing touch of Adam Smith in Amartya Sen’s account of Public Reasoning: the Man Within for the Man Without," Economics Working Paper from Condorcet Center for political Economy at CREM-CNRS 2019-01-ccr, Condorcet Center for political Economy.
    17. Matthias P. Hühn & Claus Dierksmeier, 2016. "Will the Real A. Smith Please Stand Up!," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 136(1), pages 119-132, June.
    18. Antoine Billot, 2009. "How to shake the invisible hand (when Robinson meets Friday)," International Journal of Economic Theory, The International Society for Economic Theory, vol. 5(3), pages 257-270, September.
    19. Khalil, Elias, 2022. "Does Friendship Stem from Altruism? Adam Smith and the Distinction between Love-based and Interest-based Preferences," OSF Preprints ygpmq, Center for Open Science.
    20. Emiel F.M. Wubben, 2011. "Do Rules and Regulations Bind or Boost Economic Growth?," Chapters, in: Emiel F.M. Wubben (ed.), Institutions and Regulation for Economic Growth?, chapter 1, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    21. Xu, Xiaofang & Wan, Qi & Ma, Jingru & Peng, Qilin, 2025. "What drives institutional investors' site visit decisions: The role of local business environment in China," International Review of Financial Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 103(C).
    22. Avner Offer, 2012. "Self-interest, Sympathy and the Invisible Hand : From Adam Smith to Market Liberalism," Economic Thought, World Economics Association, vol. 1(2), pages 1-1, December.
    23. repec:ejw:journl:v:6:y:2009:i:2:p:264-279 is not listed on IDEAS
    24. Mollie Painter-Morland & Rosa Slegers, 2018. "Strengthening “Giving Voice to Values” in Business Schools by Reconsidering the “Invisible Hand” Metaphor," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 147(4), pages 807-819, February.
    25. Santori, Paolo & Assistant, JHET, 2021. "Idleness and the Very Sparing Hand of God: The invisible tie between Hume’s "Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion" and Smith’s "Wealth of Nations"," OSF Preprints r2uje, Center for Open Science.
    26. Maria Pia Paganelli, 2014. "Adam Smith and Entangled Political Economy," Advances in Austrian Economics, in: Entangled Political Economy, volume 18, pages 37-54, Emerald Group Publishing Limited.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • B0 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - General
    • B3 - Schools of Economic Thought and Methodology - - History of Economic Thought: Individuals

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ebl:ecbull:eb-06b00002. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: John P. Conley (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.